1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a liquid cooling system having several cooling units, which are individually assigned to electronic component groups housed in a rack or switchgear cabinet and which are to be cooled, and also having a monitoring and control arrangement for monitoring the cooling temperature.
2. Discussion of Related Art
A liquid cooling system is disclosed in German Patent Reference DE 196 09 651 C2 in connection with a switchgear cabinet air-conditioning arrangement. In this case, the liquid cooling system is designed, for example, as a cooling device or cooling unit with an air/water heat exchanger and represents a component of the entire air-conditioning arrangement, which is monitored and controlled or regulated by a higher-order monitoring and control arrangement. It is possible with the cooling system, together with the monitoring and control arrangement, to provide varied control concepts of the air-conditioning arrangement, depending on its type of employment or the wishes of the user. Thus there is also a possibility of locally cooling individual electronic component groups, for which purpose fan units, which are assigned to them, are triggered. However, if a rack or a switchgear cabinet has a multitude of electronic component groups with high computer output, very large amounts of heat can collect, particularly in the area of the computer units, which are difficult to remove even with such a cooling arrangement.
A switchgear cabinet monitoring and control system is taught by PCT International Publication WO 97/34345, into which an air-conditioning device with a cooling apparatus and fans, as well as heat exchangers, are integrated. A cooling concept for removing heat in the vicinity of individual component groups is not described in this publication.